In December of 1992, several fellow teachers and I wrote a concept paper for a restructured school, weaving together the educational ideas that excited us most. We envisioned a school that would address the prior needs of the children (the Comer Process), that would engage children in accelerated learning (Levin), and that would involve all of the children's intelligences and talents (Gardner). Language would be the lens through which children examined the world (the New Zealand schools). Children would write in journals, in books that they assembled, and on charts and papers that would fill the walls and hallways.
Most of our work would be done in long-term, interdisciplinary projects, often involving members of the community working with children in apprentice-like situations. Children would learn to work cooperatively in small groups, with adults as facilitators—our special subjects teachers, parent volunteers, and members of the community and the universities. With this purposeful parental and community involvement, we believe children will eventually acquire the skills to work independently. Finally, we would strive to do all this by working from the children's real questions, concerns, and passions, pulling all our efforts together in the “flow experiences” so aptly described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990).
The Mellon and Heinz Foundations awarded us $320,000 to implement these bold ambitions. McCleary School, a beautiful stone schoolhouse built in 1900 in Lawrenceville, one of the poorest neighborhoods in Pittsburgh, was renovated and reopened as our restructuring school.
The Origins of Room G
As we soon found out, restructuring did not exempt us from the normal problems a school faces. A week before school started, we discovered that instead of the 150 students we were expecting, we would have 282. Because of overcrowding, we had to lose our art and music room, temporarily, and convert our basement gym to a 5th grade classroom, Room G. We had to hire seven substitute teachers, who had no previous knowledge of our restructuring design nor training in our methods. We also faced other common school discipline problems, including the lunchroom, the playground, and the class nobody can handle—Room G, as it turned out!
First, we turned our attention to improving discipline in the lunchroom, using a $2,500 grant from Alcoa Corporation. As the school's co-principal, I invited our consultant, Kay Atman from the University of Pittsburgh, to come in and observe the lunchroom. She offered a surprising analysis: no one could behave in such an ugly room! We brainstormed and began to think of changing the lunchroom into an elegant restaurant. We talked about having Room G, already on its fourth teacher, take charge of this project. Transforming the lunchroom into a restaurant could be a way to implement key aspects of our original restructuring design and solve several problems at once: modeling project-learning for overburdened teachers, providing discipline in the lunchroom, meeting the expectations of Alcoa, and improving the behavior of Room G.
The Design of the Royal Boot
First, I discussed the restaurant idea with a number of our specialists—our librarian, our art teacher, our Chapter 1 math teacher, and others—as well as with our Room G classroom teacher. I also talked to a former art teacher from the community, an interior decorator, our technology adviser, the lunch aides, the bus driver, and a school volunteer. I invited all these people as well as Kay Atman to work with small groups of the 5th graders in Room G.
Then I approached the children in Room G. I described the need for a better lunchroom, told them about the Alcoa grant, and explained that I had selected them to work with me on this project—if they agreed. They were enthusiastic. The most important requirement of the project was, I explained, that we would have to carefully plan every step and produce quality work. Unless they could make this commitment, we should not go ahead. They agreed, although we knew they didn't yet fully understand what I was asking.
We needed to begin, I suggested, by choosing a theme for our restaurant. The children talked about restaurants they knew that had themes. Then we broke into small groups where the key adults I had recruited helped the children choose themes and names to propose to the whole class. The children came up with some wonderful names—Broadway!, McCleary Rain Forest, McCleary Gardens, and Midnight Stars. The winning theme, however, was simply Italian, and the name they chose was the Royal Boot or Le Stivale Royale in Italian, as the children proposing this idea discovered through a phone call to the public library.
We formed five committees: public relations and advertising; management; art and design; planning and budgeting; and research. Children chose their committees and attended meetings with their restaurant-journals in hand. Within the committees, they began to develop very strong opinions about how this restaurant should operate.
Putting It All Together
Two months of very intensive work began. One committee of 5th graders researched Italy—its flag, monuments, map, language, stories, and artists. Another group used computers to make banners, which they painted and hung from the ceiling. Other children measured the space in the lunchroom and produced an Italian mural and collages.
One committee visited a restaurant to study its management and decor, and then went shopping for decorations—dried peppers and garlic wreathes, waxed Italian fruits and cheeses, a tree, and centerpieces. Another committee made up the guest list for the grand opening. In consultation with Skip the bus driver, the 5th graders decided to invite people from Alcoa, the school district, Food Service, the media, and everyone who had helped them.
The public relations/advertising committee prepared the younger children for how to behave in the restaurant. Working in pairs, the group developed, with my help, mini-lessons comparing the present lunchroom situation with the behavior one would see in a restaurant. The opportunity to teach younger children seemed to be particularly satisfying to Room G.
With Opening Day rapidly approaching, we needed to bring in more helpers. We involved the 2nd grade in comparison shopping at Murphy's and K-Mart for tableclothes. In K-Mart, they sat in the aisles with their calculators and journals, figuring out how much money they could save if they went back to Murphy's. One child said to me, “Hey, we're doing a lot of math. Do we have to go back and do math again?”
“No, this is your math lesson.”
“What a school!”
With the help of a lunch aide, some children prepared pasta for centerpieces. Other students in Room G wrote an acknowledgment speech, and one class did a science experiment to turn white carnations into red and green gifts for us. Miss Angie, a member of the community, helped one committee translate the school menu, into Italian, and these children typed the programs and menus on the computer. Children continued to record all this in their journals and to reflect every day on what had been accomplished.
Suddenly everyone wanted to help. Lunch aides helped some of the 5th graders prepare pasta. Food Service sent antipasto and Italian ice to supplement the regular fare. Miss Angie brought Italian music. Mama Rosa's contributed jars of spaghetti sauce for each visitor.
The management committee selected G students as maître d', head waiter, doorman, hostess, and waitpersons and set up a rotation schedule so that everyone would have an opportunity to work in the restaurant. This group carefully trained the students to treat all the children as customers deserving respect (“May I help you open that ketchup?” “May I take your plate away?”) Later, Brandon, our headwaiter, decided to carry a clipboard and report to each teacher how his or her class was behaving.
Finally, everything was in place. With Pachebel's Canon playing, the 5th grade Room G students posed for pictures in their dress-up clothes and delighted in the transformation of the lunchroom into an elegant restaurant with its dim lights, decorated walls, festive tablecloths, and a lighted tree in the deli. Despite their pride in their accomplishments, they worried about how the other classes would behave. Would they throw pasta at the superintendent?
Then they heard the sound of children walking, not running, to the lunchroom. Faces appeared at the door, and Rashid, our maître d', held up four fingers and beckoned the first group in. The hostess held back the fifth child until the first group was seated. It was going to work.
The Aftermath and Beginning
The next day, however, when I went to the restaurant, the tablecloths weren't out, the lights weren't dimmed, and the music wasn't playing. When I asked them why these things hadn't been done, they said, “Oh, that was yesterday, for the opening.”
I said, “No, that's every day.”
They said, “You mean it's always going to be like this?” And they got out the tablecloths.
The opening was so inspirational that I knew what needed to happen next. Entertainment. We have now become a cabaret, where students, faculty, and even parents perform to the delight of the customers. A frequent question from the children is “What's the entertainment at the Royal Boot today?” Everyone wants to come to the lunchroom. Independence, pride, and self- esteem are evident everywhere.
We no longer have a lunchroom discipline problem, but we have achieved far more than that. Our other 5th grade class has now decided to create a multicultural playground. The students are researching games from around the world. This has been tied into a 2nd grade science project. All the teachers are thinking of projects—and grants too. What we thought was the end is only the beginning.
Lessons from Our Restaurant Project
- First projects are different. We now believe that teachers can initiate first projects when children have no previous experience with them. Geoff Ward says in I've Got a Project On...: You might try negotiating the choice of topic with the class, but I would recommend leaving this aspect of project work till later. Learning to select a topic from an open field is in itself a difficult task and one which may be better managed after a successful experience in conducting a project (1988, p. 11).
- Csikszentmihalyi (1990) was right: strong challenges are necessary to produce flow, challenges that can be met and that are as great as the children's ability.
- Shared success leads to independence and self-esteem.
- Children will develop their own evaluations and refinements, if they value the project and feel ownership. No one suggested the clipboard to Brandon. Children kept their own portfolios. They decided to keep an anecdotal record of lunchroom behavior before and after.
- Behavioral objectives, while important, are too limited to capture all the positive outcomes of a project when it takes off. One must also consider Elliot Eisner's expressive objectives “that stipulate that what you are seeking to develop is whatever results from a planned learning experience or activity” (Ward 1988, p. 47). Otherwise you may be limiting your outcomes.
- The Comer Process is sound: it is important to involve as many significant adults as possible, and for them to always be there because they are totally engaged.
- Teachers' enthusiasm for project learning takes off when the teachers are fully engaged in a project themselves, not just as directors and facilitator, but as full participants.
- Good work builds personal relationships; personal relationships build school communities.
School restructuring exists to make all this more likely to happen.
